


Conclusion

by Cerdic519



Series: Further Adventures Of Mr. Sherlock Holmes [97]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: 20th Century, Bees, Death from Old Age, Edwardian Period, F/M, Gay Sex, M/M, Retirement, World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-30
Updated: 2018-08-30
Packaged: 2019-07-04 13:42:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15842469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: Some final notes by Sherrinford Holmes – and a surprise!





	Conclusion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Justbecause421](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Justbecause421/gifts).



_Narration by Sir Sherrinford Holmes, Baronet_

After their Border adventure and the blessing of their union (for which a certain bastard of a muscled behemoth insisted on collecting his winnings just before a social event on damnably hard chairs, damn him!), Sherlock and John returned to London for their remaining time at 221B. The doctor later remarked that he felt he had said goodbye to Baker Street already, so it was _not_ necessary for my brother to remark that they had celebrated their departure with sex in every one of their rooms before they had left and then done the same to mark their arrival in _my_ cottage!

Sherlock would continue to have two more adventures with John; _The Lion's Mane_ in 1907 and of course _His Last Bow_ in 1914. I know that it pained the doctor that he had to openly lie about their not seeing each other during this first decade of the great man's retirement, but society was not yet read to accept relationships such as that they and I enjoyed so it was necessary. Although he remarked that he made up for it by seeing a whole lot of my brother.

I really had to stop Kean giving him ideas!

John had eight further adventures published in the _”Strand”_ magazine the year after they moved to my estate, where Sherlock was able to indulge his passion for bee-keeping and John was able to indulge.... well, let us just say that the lack of any close neighbours was a blessing for everyone! A further eight stories were published in the run-up to their last case, and although Sherlock had to spend some time away from John leading up to that he sent him tokens of his affection all the time. How someone as stoic and cold as my eldest brother had ended up such a sap..... and someone across the room had better not even _think_ of smirking!

The year 1912 was famous for the loss of a certain ocean liner, but I had happier news when my son Stephen married and the following year he and his wife Gwendolyn named their first-born son Sherrinford. Thankfully at least Kean had remembered a handkerchief, and took me home for some quiet holding and comforting words – well, sort of; what was left of me afterwards did not care about my advancing years. Or anything much.

There was a slight bump in Sherlock and John's retirement in 1917 when young Lieutenant Benjamin Warburton, whom the reader may remember was the offspring of the un-lamented Henry Watson and hence in reality John's nephew, had to be extricated from the Gaza Campaign against the Ottoman Empire. Unfortunately his mother had died back in 1902 shortly before she had been supposed to inform him of his true origins, but as they say truth will out and his 'father' Captain Matthew Warburton had discovered that the boy was not his. He chose to make this plain when poor Benjamin, then thirty-three years of age, limped home a broken man and was thrown out of the family home. Most fortuitously however an old servant was able to direct him to John, and Sherlock secured him an office job at the War Office. He married two years later, and when he adopted the Watson name and called his first-born son John there may have been a tear in a certain doctor's eye. But it was a manly tear.

John continued to work through some of the other cases the two had worked on, the relatively slow pace of his output being due more to many of the stories only being able to be published once certain people had passed than any lack of effort on his part. I know how much he enjoyed bringing his great friend's achievements to the world, and the demand for them only grew as the years passed. The last story he finished working on was _Shoscombe Old Place_ , which came out late in 1927. He was ill at the time and through much of the following year, and although he rallied briefly in 1929 he died that autumn, his last request that Sherlock not follow him to Heaven before his time. I know that my brother still keeps the cottage exactly as it was when he still had the man he loved, and doubtless when he does get to Heaven there will be a similar cottage there waiting for him, with the man he loves inside it.

It has been a great pleasure to have added these eighty-four new stories to 'the Sherlock canon', and to all those from my brother's cases who had reached this point and duly breathed a sigh of relief that their own foibles were not brought to light, one final thought:

Sherlock kept his own set of records as well!

۩۩۩۩G♔RI۩۩۩۩


End file.
